No matter now bad LBJ looks, Cleveland looks worse

[maxpower]

Between Gilbert's letter, the jersey burnings, and the general angsty whining, that fair city is coming off as the stereotypical jilted, psycho ex-girlfriend. No matter how bad the city got screwed (and I don't believe it did), this outburst is pathetic.

Stay classy, Cleveland.

 

[Rickzcards]

You have to give Lebron a little credit for doing what most superstars won't do, give up making as much money to go somewhere else and win. He never would have won in Cleveland and while they haven't won anything yet the Heat are the odds on favorites now. Cleveland doesn't look bad in this whole affair, just Dan Gilbert for writing that letter. Well if he did indeed write that. On a side note, one little thing I was reading about Lebron the other day ago on Yahoo is that he is a Dallas Cowboys & New York Yankees fan. Talk about a bandwagon fan, I hate people that are bandwagon fans.

 

[Daltonb1219]

The Cavs owner who also created fatheads reduced the price of all remaining fathead items to $17.41 because that was the birth year of Benedict Arnold.

 

[Anthony K.]

I WOULD agree with this....had LeBron not fed his ego with an hour long show about the decision he made weeks ago.

Instead, he brought his team and city on a national stage and stabbed them in the back.

 

[Bornagaincollector]

After 24 hrs of knowing this,my opinion still hasn't changed.He said he wanted to win a championship and Miami gives him that chance.I do agree that this dragged out process was crazy and i believe he knew for at least a week that he would be going to Miami.

He could have handled it better,but we will move on and i have great respect for Lebron on what he did for this city for 7 years.We have to move on as fans and i will move on.

Bryon Scott will get the best out of this team and i believe Jamison will be a 20-9 man this year since he is the man now on this team.

 

[Jastermereel]

I really have no opinion on this matter other than on how the owner acted. PLEASE! He acts like his anger is over something other than money. Give me a break. The value of the Cavs climbed $200 million dollars since LeBron joined them. Imagine how much it dropped over the course of an hour last night?

 

[sdsportsfan1214]

I think Gilbert is gonna have to eat his words cuz Lebron will win one before the Cavs do

 

[The_ReverendAct2]

Let's. Face it none of the top fa wanted to come to Cleveland. Lebron wanted bosh but bosh wanted no parts of Cleveland. Once lebron left and owner made a fool of himself they will not get big name stars to come there. Do you blame them? We blast stars about playing for the money only. Lebron gave up a lot to win. Enough said. Miami will win way before the cabs.

 

[rymflaherty]

Yeah that was pretty bad. I heard what was released was actually screened by the PR department....so that was actually the sanatized version lol.....can't imagine then what he wanted to say. After what Lebron did for the team, all the attention he brought, you'd think an owner would act in a more respectful way.

Have to imagine it's the way Lebron handled things that set him off - beyond what others already said regarding the "special", I think it's also the fact he never even bothered to talk to them days beforehand, you'd have to imagine if he was a man, informed them of their decision and explained why, it may not have been as harsh a reaction.
I have to wonder if the way this played out - seeking attention, not acting like a man, avoiding conflict and a tough conversation/situation, etc. - isn't simply a microcosm for the type of person/player Lebron is.

 

[Anthony K.]

Yeah that was pretty bad. I heard what was released was actually screened by the PR department....so that was actually the sanatized version lol.....can't imagine then what he wanted to say. After what Lebron did for the team, all the attention he brought, you'd think an owner would act in a more respectful way.

Have to imagine it's the way Lebron handled things that set him off - beyond what others already said regarding the "special", I think it's also the fact he never even bothered to talk to them days beforehand, you'd have to imagine if he was a man, informed them of their decision and explained why, it may not have been as harsh a reaction.
I have to wonder if the way this played out - seeking attention, not acting like a man, avoiding conflict and a tough conversation/situation, etc. - isn't simply a microcosm for the type of person/player Lebron is.

How much I hate to bring this up, you have to believe that a part of this is from LeBron growing up without a father figure and basically still being an immature child. Don't get me wrong, I still act immature for my age, but I know how to act like a man as well, which is something LeBron has never shown.

I still stick to my guns that LeBron will come out of this whole situation worse than anyone else.

I wouldn't be surprised if games in Cleveland require extra security personnel, for LeBron's safety.

 

[maxpower]

Yeah that was pretty bad. I heard what was released was actually screened by the PR department....so that was actually the sanatized version lol.....can't imagine then what he wanted to say. After what Lebron did for the team, all the attention he brought, you'd think an owner would act in a more respectful way.

Have to imagine it's the way Lebron handled things that set him off - beyond what others already said regarding the "special", I think it's also the fact he never even bothered to talk to them days beforehand, you'd have to imagine if he was a man, informed them of their decision and explained why, it may not have been as harsh a reaction.
I have to wonder if the way this played out - seeking attention, not acting like a man, avoiding conflict and a tough conversation/situation, etc. - isn't simply a microcosm for the type of person/player Lebron is.

I agree with you to a degree, but with the backlash as powerful as it was, I question how much of this conflict with Gilbert was brewing before LeBron left. The outburst makes me wonder what Gilbert had already said privately that may have gotten back to LeBron and soured him on Cleveland. As a man, you owe your employer respect when your employer gives you respect. If your employer is a napoleonic egomaniac and is trashing you about being a quitter behind your back, you no longer owe that employer jack as far as courtesy goes.

LeBron the high school educated 25 year old seemed somewhat immature for his actions. But Gilbert, a billionaire lawyer and businessman, was straight up acting like a petulant 3 year old. As I said before, neither looked good, but Gilbert looked WAY worse.

 

[maxpower]

Yeah that was pretty bad. I heard what was released was actually screened by the PR department....so that was actually the sanatized version lol.....can't imagine then what he wanted to say. After what Lebron did for the team, all the attention he brought, you'd think an owner would act in a more respectful way.

Have to imagine it's the way Lebron handled things that set him off - beyond what others already said regarding the "special", I think it's also the fact he never even bothered to talk to them days beforehand, you'd have to imagine if he was a man, informed them of their decision and explained why, it may not have been as harsh a reaction.
I have to wonder if the way this played out - seeking attention, not acting like a man, avoiding conflict and a tough conversation/situation, etc. - isn't simply a microcosm for the type of person/player Lebron is.

How much I hate to bring this up, you have to believe that a part of this is from LeBron growing up without a father figure and basically still being an immature child. Don't get me wrong, I still act immature for my age, but I know how to act like a man as well, which is something LeBron has never shown.

I still stick to my guns that LeBron will come out of this whole situation worse than anyone else.

I wouldn't be surprised if games in Cleveland require extra security personnel, for LeBron's safety.

It's true about the father figure, but that makes me even more lenient on the way I look at LeBron. He's 25, never went to college, had no father figure, but the absolute worst we can say about him is that he maybe sought a bit too much attention in his free agent search. Frankly, that's the kind of behavior I could see almost any 25 year old I know engaging in.

On top of it, he's been a model citizen, mostly a great teammate, and a good philanthropist. All things considered, I think he's turned out okay. With all the money and adulation, he's basically turned out to be your average 25 year old - not perfect and sometimes immature, but basically a decent human being.

 

[mlbsalltimegreats]

Great Points everyone but does anyone else besides myself think that maybe it wasnt Lebron who set this whole thing up? This cannot be all Lebrons fault on how he choose to tell everyone where he was going. Im pretty sure Espn contacted Lebrons agent and they pitched a deal for Lebron to go on Tv for the "The Decision" and also made it known that if he does he will be helping a ton of Charities in the process. There are plenty of Agents who make dumb decisions for players and you have to consider that if you are a player you are going to listen to your Agent 99% of the time or else why have an Agent do dealings for you? Why have an Agent at all?
If someone comes up to you and makes you 3x more money or puts you and a situation that is 3x better 9 times out of 10 you will listen and do what every that person tells you (Short of killing yourself or someone else). You also have to realize that most agents have a whole different mind set in terms of whats good and bad for thier clients and dont always have the best common sense when it comes to sport things (They should but they dont). Its not like Lebron is reading Blogs or message boards and getting a good sense of what the general public is thinking all the time and most of these athletes and or celebritys are screened off by "Their People" on what us sports fans are writing or saying. I know he figured there would be some backlash as we cant please everyone but I dont think to this extent. Even now with all the bad stuff being said about the airing his agent and espn are probably telling him "This is great, espn had the biggest ratings ever and we made lots of money for these charities". Not only that they are probably only showing him stuff that people in Miami are saying and most of them at this point dont really care how he announced it.
Also Maybe because of "The Decision" one of the stipulation was that he was not to contact any of the teams he was not going too so that it dint ruin the rating for the show. Lets say he contacts Dan Gilbert and told him. Dan Gilbert would probably still been pissed off and leaked it onto the internet thus ruining the whole secret of where he was going. Sure a lot of people would have still tuned in but not as many especially in cities, Chicago, Newyork, NewJersey and Cleveland. A lot of fans would have been so upset they would'nt have bothered to turn on their televisions. Had I know before hand I would'nt even of made an effort to tune in as I knew they would of aired it again at some point and would have watched the re-run.
I have to agree with Maxpower in that Gilbert really made cleveland look bad. They pretty much blew what slim chances they had of landing a big time player. If you look at next year, you have possibly Carmelo and Chris Paul as Free Agents. First of all its not like the Nuggets and Hornets are not going to do their damnest to keep both of those player where they are at. Its going to be hard enough to pry those players from their comfort zone. Second now that they have seen what kind of backlash Lebron has taken from him home town fans (Burning Jerseys, Ect) these guys are going to think twice now about leaving. Now its going to be that much harder. Third with the way the owner came off and the things he said (Keep in mind that there was a report that the letter was looked over and had to be re-done because it had even worst stuff in it?) he pretty much cemented any chance of a superstar comming to Cleveland because now they think he is crazy and had hidden intents the whole time. At this point it doesnt really matter if he apologizes as he has already done long term damage for that franchise.

 

[Watt]

Your point of LeBron not telling any other team to keep suspense and ratings up doesn't really work because Chris Broussard, an ESPN reporter, broke the story of him going to Miami the night before.

 

[Anthony K.]

Your point of LeBron not telling any other team to keep suspense and ratings up doesn't really work because Chris Broussard, an ESPN reporter, broke the story of him going to Miami the night before.

You do know the CB was not the only person to "break" the news of him going to Miami, right?

He has the same "sources" as everyone else who was breaking the story. He also said that LeBron was going to re-sign with Cleveland, sign with Chicago and sign with New York.

So saying he "broke" the news isn't saying much.

 

[mlbsalltimegreats]

Your point of LeBron not telling any other team to keep suspense and ratings up doesn't really work because Chris Broussard, an ESPN reporter, broke the story of him going to Miami the night before.

I hear what your saying but like Anthony said above Plently of reporters had their stories of where he was going. Im just saying had the Cavs Owner come out and leaked it before hand it think it would have hurt rating a bit. That is not to say a lot of people would'nt have still watched. I guess I just imagine Espn and his agent telling him to stay hush as a percausion even it they felt it wouldnt hurt ratings. You know the guy who really looks good is Steven A. Smith who I think before they anounced the program "The Decision" Said the All 3 were going to Miami. Apperently he knew before anyone.

 

[maxpower]

In the Gilbert/LeBron/Jesse/David Stern shatstorm that's been dominating sports talk, here's one fact that hasn't gotten much play:

The Boys & Girls Club is getting $2.5 million from last week's telecast.

Whether you liked it or not, it's tough to criticize the eventual outcome. Lots of people moralizing on this topic, but empty words do a lot less good than concrete contributions.


Source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/38168279